A significant portion of oil produced in Canada is produced using a technique known as cold heavy oil production with sand (CHOPS). This technique allows sand inside the well bore in order to improve well production. Additionally, the technique utilizes a pumping device and residual pressure in the reservoir to lift the oil to the surface. As a result of the pumping device, oil coming to the surface is heavy, viscous, and contains a lot of water and sand. This oil and sand mixture is then separated at the surface.
It is common practice in the oil field to truck or pump oil into heated or ambient temperature holding tanks where the water, and solids, and sometimes oil separate from the mixture via gravity. Vacuum trucks are then employed to remove the oil and water/solids mixture that has settled at the bottom of the holding tank. During this process, the water and settled solids can become re-suspended and drawn into the awaiting truck. In order to re-settle the solids in the truck, operators pump supernatant water back into the tank and pump additional slurry into the truck to facilitate settling and maximize the amount of solids loaded.
This standard process is not time efficient since the operators need to wait for the solids to resettle before pumping the water back to the system. Further, a lot of space in the truck is taken up by water that displaces solids and reduces the amount of solids that can be transported per load to the remediation facility. This reduces the efficiency
Therefore, a need exists to develop chemistries to separate solids from the liquid slurry.